Although the starts on both fronts - men’s as well as women’s team - were not ideal, but the Indian team played up to their reputation of being the top side in their group by entering the second round of the 19th Commonwealth Table Tennis Championships at the Thyagraj Indoor Stadium, here on Sunday, the opening day of the tournament.
Mouma Das opened for the eves, who are clubbed in Group C with Sri lanka and Canada, lost the first game 13-15 against Ishara Madurangi, who profited as Mouma erred. But, after the first game hiccup, the top-ranked Indian with a world ranking of 231, fought back with impunity and moved past the unseeded lankan 11-5, 11-3 and 11-4 in the next three games to earn a 3-1 verdict. Her other teammates - Shamini Kumaresan and Neha Aggarwal - breezed past Nuwani G Vithange and Ridhmi Karadanaarachchi respectively. While Shamini won 11-7, 14-12, 11-8, Neha sealed the tie for the hosts with a scoreline of 11-4, 11-6, 11-5.
In their second encounter with the Canadian girls team, Indian eves won two matches. First, Shamini dominated the proceedings against Sara Yuen and defeated the 493 ranked girl 11-5, 11-5 and 11-7, then in the next tie, Mouma opened with a 11-6 win but again dropped a game 4-11 to 508 ranked Shierley FU. But, once again on the day, she came back to defeat the Canadian 11-7 and 14-12. Overall, Mouma was made to toil for her wins in both the matches and she even dropped a game in each matches. The Indian got a bye to sail into next round as Canada’s Mo Zhang is yet to arrive.
The Indian team got a much bigger jolt as Australian 625th ranked David Powell caused an upset by defeating 2011 national champion and 149th-ranked Anthony Amalraj in the first tie. Amalraj looked out of sorts and lost out three straight sets - 7-11, 8-11 and 8-11. Amalraj was found wanting on both defence and attack. While his over-aggressive shot was flying high, his defensive tricks failed to stop Powell’s confidence which kept growing.
But, to comfort the host, 70th ranked veteran Achantha Sharath Kamal utilized his experience to the fullest and defeated 17-year old Kane Townsend 11-5, 13-11, 11-8 to make it 1-1 for his team.
Then, 2012 london Olympian Soumyajit Ghosh eased past Wade Townsend 11-3, 11-6, 11-7 to give India a 2-1 advantage before Kamal again produced the match-winning scores - 11-3, 11-8 and 11-3 against David Powell in the reverse tie.
After the 3-1 victory over Australians, the men’s team faced an easy opponent - South Africa and went easy against them.
Kamal made short work of 785th -ranked Kurt lingeveldt and won by 11-9, 11-5, 11-5 to register third win in as many matches before Amalraj made amends for the first game loss and won the match against luke Abrahams 11-9, 12-10 and 11-5.
In the third tie, Ghosh was hardly troubled by Cogill Theo and handed second win for India with a scoreline of 11-5, 11-6, 11-4.